Voice

We’ve written before about how texting could be used for political campaigns. You could use it for voter registration, voting day reminders, or even to set up a text hotline to get real-time feedback on what’s going on at polling places.

Ben & Jerry’s is rallying climate activists (and anyone with a sweet tooth) to take action on climate change. The ice cream maker, a long-time supporter of climate justice, is urging citizens worldwide to contact world leaders in advance of the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris, which begins at the end of November.

Are you ready to say bonjour to the simple life? Stella Artois thinks so.

OneReach recently collaborated with Stella Artois, ad agency Mother New York and production company Stopp to create a unique user experience for Stella Artois web visitors. To promote their Hamptons Picnic Properties sweepstakes, Stella Artois provided users with an interactive experience where users could chat with brand ambassador Le Président before entering to win the competition.

If you’re anything like me, you’re bothered (maybe even offended) by retail businesses answering the phone instead of helping patrons.

We’ve all seen it happen. A customer is waiting to check out when the clerk answers the phone (sometimes several times), often only to respond to the caller with store hours or the address. On behalf of the patron who’s standing there waiting and the caller, I’m annoyed by this.

When it comes to balancing customer experience and operational efficiency, it can be really hard to get things right for your customers (and for your pockets). There are a lot of strategies, tools, consultants, methodologies and processes that you could be leveraging in order to operate your well-oiled machine (and of course you’re already doing all of those things, right?).

But what if there were things right in front of your nose that aren’t complicated, expensive or time-consuming, and could really make things easier and better for you and your customers?

That’s what we want to address in this series, and first up: making your business phone smarter.

Many of today’s top businesses offer a mobile app, and all of them are looking for downloads in an increasingly prevalent mobile market. There were an estimated 138 billion global app downloads in 2014, and that number is set to double to 270 billion in 2017. With over half of American consumers downloading around four apps a month, how can your business tap into the booming mobile app market and increase downloads?

Answer: promote downloads through text message and voice, the two most common activities done on a mobile device.

One of America’s biggest corporations is shaking up its internal communications.

Coca-Cola employees are being encouraged to text one another to increase productivity, rather than make outgoing calls and leaving messages. If anyone tries leave a message for a colleague, they’re stopped by an automated message encouraging them to try alternative forms of communication.

For years, contact centers have measured performance by ASA (average speed of answer). An ASA under 60 seconds is considered successful, but today’s customers are used to instant access. Having to wait even ten more seconds could be enough for a customer to drop the call.

Whenever people call a business, they want information; they don’t necessarily want to speak with someone. By forcing callers to go through a complicated phone tree, wait on hold before speaking with someone, or being asked to visit a website, the callers is being forced to go through extra steps that result in feelings of frustration. In fact, 81% of customers feel frustrated being tied to a phone or computer for customer support. By allowing the caller to opt-out of a complicated voice experience and into a more convenient channel such as SMS, you can show your customers that you honor their preferences.